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| Maus I and II; Maus auf Deutsch |
I can't remember the first time I got turned on to Art Spiegelman's graphic novel, Maus. I was an adult when Maus was first was published. Had I been a pupil, then I'm confident that my school district here in the SF Bay Area would have included the text in its curriculum. -not so, had I been attending a school in Tennessee, it would seem.
Hey, you, Tennessee Board of Education: It's about the Holocaust! And I'm sure Amazon thanks you as well in that U.S. sales of Maus are now shooting through the roof given the renewed interest.
Comics used to be the problem. Now it's graphic novels that are being attacked for potentially poisoning the minds of our youth. Far be it for a book to educate kids about the horrors of the Third Reich!
Tenn. Board of Ed. wants 'age appropriate' texts to be used in teaching about the the Holocaust. Um, what? Maus was being taught in Jr. High level classes. Kids are typically 13 years old in 8th grade and not babies.
Tennessee parents and the Board of Ed. would seem to be focused in on some 'distasteful' sections in the book and not talking about the real issue: The Holocaust. They seem want some kind of sanitized version of the annihilation of millions of people to present to students.
In Maus, Spiegelman chronicles finding his mother dead in the bath after her having committed suicide some years after surviving the camps. The Board of Ed. took issue with this depiction as it showed an image of a 'nude' woman. There's nothing sexual about showing a woman dead in the bath. She's naked, she's in the bath. Breasts will probably be exposed when one is in the bath. If I could roll my eyes any harder at this ridiculousness they'd probably become stuck in the back of my head.
I'm not sure what the Tennessee Board of Ed. and parents want. Is there a Walt Disney* version of the Holocaust? The folks behind the book banning aren't Nazis, but they sure are making white supremacists happy with this nonsense
*Disney was an anti-Semite.
Scary. I worry about this newest round of book banning. I mean, it's gone on for many, many years, so it's nothing new. But people seem to be getting back to it again. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteParents getting it wrong for generations.
DeleteSigh. I am really, really opposed to banning books. And fail to see how the Holocaust can be sanitised. And nor should it be. Interesting that it was some totally appropriate nudity that caused problems, rather than the atrocities which I would love to ban. Not the depiction of them, but their occurrence.
ReplyDeleteYes, a body is a body. And certainly the context in which a woman's form were displayed should merit some consideration!
DeleteA close friend of mine works at the local art school and has to use the in-house email system to organise things. She had to book life models for classes, and called them 'nude' models. The in-house security system quarantined her message to a technical assistant because it contained the word 'nude', so she tried 'naked' - same problem. I suggested she should try 'completely fucking naked' but that was not considered a good idea.
ReplyDeleteSomeone in a self-appointed position of authority must sit down and think of every swear word in their limited vocabulary and still get it wrong.
Indeed.
DeleteThose book banners are ignorance personified.
ReplyDeleteIt's really frustrating.
DeleteYou commented on my blog but had two comments you had deleted. I went to remove them and accidentally removed your comment (and I had not even read it). So sorry about that. Not sure how it happened as two must have gone at the same time.
ReplyDeleteMy fingers were particularly inelegant when trying to type a comment. I had typos and was a bit 😳.
ReplyDeleteThis makes me sick, disgusted, and ashamed of some people in this country. People won't do a damn thing about guns in our schools, kids traumatized doing live shooter drills; but they're worried about a book that teaches history. Shame on the school systems, shame on the parents who support this BS, and shame on all who don't scream from the rooftops that this is wrong on so many levels. I hope lots of kids and parents in that system buy the book, get the book from the library etc. Excellent blog post!
ReplyDeleteSandy's Space As you know I've been on WWII reading/listening binge of late and there's so much to learn about this horrible time in the history of our world.
Go, Sandy!! It's really an awful situation, isn't it? Like you, I hope that parents and kids avail themselves of the public library and borrow Maus I and II.
DeleteArgh....just realized I didn't have the right thing on my clipboard for above's comment. Sorry about that. https://4ccccs.blogspot.com/2022/02/blanket-of-many-colors-tadah-american.html
ReplyDeleteI remember at school not being able to draw naked bodies until I did my A Level art. So it was okay to see them at 17, but not 16. And I have to say drawing naked bodies is about the most nonsexual thing I've ever done.
ReplyDeleteHuh, what's the magic shift at 17 yrs of age, I wonder. Yes, drawing nudes is the least sexy thing I can imagine. I drew two friends who were nude & it wasn't a thrill, to be sure. I was too worried about rendering them poorly!
DeleteSo sad and disturbing what goes in school districts. Not doing much good to those young minds to help them get enlightended and I am 100 percent positive what they see and hear on social media and video games is quite tame compared to Maus.
ReplyDeleteExactly. My friends with teen children tell me that there are so many highly questionable images/videos youngsters can access with smart phones, tablets, etc.
DeleteBlog rounding and hope you're doing well.
ReplyDeleteI do get perturbed with book censorship.
ReplyDeleteDear Bea, thank you for speaking out about this. Did you watch the news tonight about what was just passed--with regard to teachers and education--by the Florida government? And it's going to happen all over our country because parents have banned together to oust the critique race theory. So much fear in white supremacists and in all those who fear that people of color and people who are not "us" but "them" will "take over the world!" Let's hope that peace comes to be in their hearts and minds and in ours too.
ReplyDeleteI've not totally kept on the CRT issue. It does seem that many parents are ruled by fear and that certainly cannot be a good thing for children.
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